Ucl – Department of Space and Climate Physics
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UCL – DEPARTMENT OF SPACE AND CLIMATE PHYSICS MULLARD SPAC E SCIENCE LABORATORY The Newsletter Volume 4, Issue 4 1st April 2007 Covers events between 1st December and 28th February 2007 List of Contents General....................................................................................................................................................... 1 Visitors........................................................................................................................................................ 2 Prizes and Awards ..................................................................................................................................... 2 Telescope/Satellite time awards/proposals................................................................................................ 2 Grants and Contracts Awarded.................................................................................................................. 2 Mission Status and Developments............................................................................................................. 2 Proposals submitted................................................................................................................................... 3 Publications - Refereed.............................................................................................................................. 3 PhDs Awarded ........................................................................................................................................... 5 Invited Talks and Lectures ......................................................................................................................... 6 Conferences and Workshops (National and International) ........................................................................ 6 Media Broadcasts and Features ................................................................................................................ 7 Outreach..................................................................................................................................................... 7 Press Releases .......................................................................................................................................... 8 Other News ................................................................................................................................................ 8 Next Issue .................................................................................................................................................. 8 General Congratulations go to David Brockley and Chris Brockley-Blatt and to Tracey Poole on the birth of their sons and to Gill Watson on the birth of her twins. Congratulations also go to Hazel McAndrews who was married on March 23. - 1 - Visitors Space Plasma Physics Group:- • Dr. Bertrand Lefebvre from Imperial College London visited and gave a seminar entitled “Electron dynamics and cross-shock potential at the quasi-perpendicular Earth bow shock” on 4 Dec 2006. • Dr Adrian Grocott from the University of Leicester visited and presented a seminar entitled “Tail reconnection during IMF-northward non-substorm intervals” on 30 Jan 2007. Planetary Science Group:- • Dr. Nicolas André from ESTEC visited from 5-9 Feb to work with Andrew Coates, Hazel McAndrews and Chris Arridge on spin-periodicities in Saturn’s magnetosphere. He presented a seminar on Saturn’s magnetosphere. • Dr. Marina Galand from Imperial College visited Andrew Coates to work on Titan on 19 Feb and delivered a seminar on Titan photoelectrons and proton aurorae. • Dr. Caitriona Jackman from Imperial College visited on Wednesday 28 Feb to discuss observations of tail reconnection at Saturn with Hazel McAndrews and Chris Arridge. Prizes and Awards Chris Arridge won an AGU Outstanding Student Presentation award for his talk, “Magnetodisc formation at Jupiter and Saturn” at the Fall AGU Meeting 2006 in San Francisco. Gemma Attrill won the Alan Johnstone Award for Outstanding Scientific Achievement by a Research Student. Giulio Del Zanna has been offered the (highly competitive) 5-year PPARC Advanced Fellowship, to be held at MSSL (start date yet to be decided). Claire Foullon has been awarded funding from the British Council, through its Researcher Exchange Programme. She is using this award to visit the Space Science Center at the University of New Hampshire (Durham, USA) for three months (from mid-January until mid-April 2007). Adam Lea won the Robert Boyd Award for Outstanding Scientific Achievement. Tracey Poole won the Elizabeth Puchnarewicz Award for her Outstanding Contribution to Public Outreach. Jason Tandy and Ady James received an award from NRL: the 2006 Alan Berman Publication/Edison Patent award. This was related to a Solar B/Hinode paper “Optics and Mechanisms for the Extreme- Ultraviolet Imaging Spectrometer (EIS) on the Solar-B Satellite”, and was presented (in absentia) at the Bolling Air Force Base. Jason Tandy won the John Raymont Award for his Outstanding Commitment to MSSL's Technology Programme. Telescope/Satellite time awards/proposals Roberto SORIA carried out radio observations of the starburst galaxy NGC 1313 from the Australia Telescope Compact Array. Grants and Contracts Awarded A proposal for development work on the electron analyser system (EAS) which is intended to be part of the Solar Wind Analyser (SWA) package on Solar Orbiter was considered at the December meeting of the PPARC Project Peer-Review Panel (PPRP), where Chris Owen presented the case. PPARC have decided to fund the proposal in full. Mission Status and Developments Cassini – Both the ELS instrument and the spacecraft are in good condition and returning good science data. Two MSSL-led papers were submitted. Cluster – All four PEACE instruments are in good condition and returning good data. The recent GRL - 2 - paper by Paul Henderson, “Cluster PEACE observations of electron pressure tensor divergence in the magnetotail”, was selected for ESA Cluster highlights and will be the top story on the ESA Cluster web- site: http://clusterlaunch.esa.int/science-e/www/object/index.cfm?fobjectid=40761 http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMZN9Q11ZE_index_0.html Cosmic Visions Candidates - Supported activities on LunaEx (MSSL-led), Jupiter/Europa, Mars Escape and Magnetic Orbiter, Titan/Enceladus, Near Earth asteroid sample return, Venus Entry Probes. In all cases we are involved in working groups and/or have attended meetings. Cross-Scale – Chris Owen has been involved with the ‘core group’ representing the community interested in the Cross-Scale concept for ESA’s Cosmic Vision 2015. Activity in the last 3 months has concentrated on providing feedback for ESA and the industrial partners who are undertaking the TRS study on the mission. Given the release of the CV2015 AO in early March, the next 3 months are likely to be busy on this front. Double Star – The PEACE instruments continue to work well. ExoMars – Andrew Coates presented at the PPRP meeting in Manchester on 5 Dec and at the PPRP Site visit in Swindon on 23 Jan. PPARC funding and ESA selection is hoped for soon. Magnetospheric Multi-Scale – PPARC science committee declined to fund this despite good reviews. Venus Express and Mars Express – ASPERA is operating well and an MSSL-led paper has been submitted. Proposals submitted ExoMars bridging grant to cover PanCam activities at MSSL until the ExoMars payload review. Publications - Refereed S & CP authors are shown in upper case. A. Published Barabash, S., Lundin, R., Andersson, H., Brinkfeldt, K., Grigoriev, A., Gunell, H., Holmstrom, M., Yamauchi, M., Asamura, K., Bochsler, P., Wurz, P., Cerulli-Irelli, R., Mura, A., Milillo, A., Maggi, M., Orsini, S., COATES, A.J., LINDER, D.R., KATARIA, D.O., Curtis, C.C., Hsieh, K.C., Sandel, B.R., Frahm, R.A., Sharber, J.R., Winningham, J.D., Grande, M., Kallio, E., Koskinen, H., Riihela, P., Schmidt, W., Sales, T., Kozyra, J.U., Krupp, N., Woch, J., Livi, S., Luhmann, J.G., McKenna-Lawlor, S., Roelof, E.C., Williams, D.J., Sauvaud, J.-A., Fedorov, A & Thocaven, J.- J., The Analyzer of Space Plasmas and Energetic Atoms (ASPERA-3) for the Mars Express Mission, Space Sci. Rev., 2007. 10.1007/s11214-006-9124-8 BRANDUARDI-RAYMONT, G., Bhardwaj, A., Elsner, R. F., Gladstone, G. R., RAMSAY, G., Rodriguez, P., SORIA, R., Waite, J. H & Cravens, T. E., A Study of Jupiter's Aurorae with XMM-Newton, Astron. & Astrophys., 463, 761-774, 2007. Jupiter's auroral X-ray emission has two components: one is line emission from ions undergoing charge exchange in the planet's atmosphere; the other is electron bremsstrahlung. Ions and electrons must be accelerated in the planet's magnetic field in order to produce the observed radiation. Clarke, K.E., André, N., Andrews, D.J., COATES, A.J., Cowley, S.W., Dougherty, M.K., LEWIS, G.R., MCANDREWS, H.J., Nichols, J.D., Robinson, T.R. & Wright, D.M., Cassini observations of planetary-period oscillations of Saturn's magnetopause, Geophysical Research Letters, 33, 23104, 2006. 10.1029/2006GL027821 DARTNELL, L.R., Desorgher, L., Ward, J.M. & COATES, A.J., Modelling the surface and subsurface Martian radiation environment: Implications for astrobiology, Geophysical Research Letters, 34, 02207, 2007. 10.1029/2006GL027494 DARTNELL, L.R., Ward, J.M. & COATES, A.J., Martian sub-surface radiation field: biosignatures and geology, Biogeosciences Discussions, 4, 445-492, 2007. Dubinin, E.M., Maksimovic, M., Cornilleau-Wehrlin, N., Fontaine, D., Travnicek,